The year 2017 will be the centennial of Scott Joplin’s death. He was interred in a community grave at St. Michael’s cemetery, East Elmhurst, NY, on April 5, 1917. The grave remained unmarked until October, 1974, when ASCAP installed a plaque.

For the centennial, we plan to add a memorial bench at the gravesite. The installation will take place on May 27, 2017, after the cemetery’s annual Scott Joplin Memorial Concert. (The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra will be performing.) We invite Scott Joplin fans and ragtimers who wish to contribute to this event to make donations, of any amount. Checks should be made out to St. Michael’s Cemetery (a non-profit, charitable organization), with “Scott Joplin Memorial” written in the memo space, and mailed to me so that I can maintain a record of donors and donations; I will forward the checks to St. Michael’s. My address is 46 Meadow Ponds Circle, Miller Place, NY 11764. Should Paypal be preferred instead of a check, payment must go to my email: edberlin36 at gmail dot com. (Use the Friends and Family option to avoid Paypal fees.) I will then submit the appropriate check to the cemetery. I will make the complete record of donors and donations public after the installation. Names of contributors will be included unless they ask to be listed as anonymous.

Ed Berlin